Royal Family Kids CampOne morning a few weeks ago, the phone rang in my office. It was Debbie Young, children’s pastor for Pottsville Assembly of God church. Debbie called to ask if I might be interested in speaking at the annual banquet for the Royal Family Kids Camps, the nation’s largest camp network for foster children. Debbie spearheaded this most important ministry in our area several years ago. They were interested in me being their speaker because I have a ...

While women make gains in elected office, numbers still lagCurrently 20 of the 100 U.S. senators are women, as are 78 of the 435 representatives, for a grand total of 18 percent of congressional seats. In contrast, according to exit polls, women made up 53 percent of the voters in the 2012 presidential election. President Obama won women by 10 points. This might lead you to wonder: Why aren’t more women running for and winning elected office? There are four times as many men in Congress as there are w...

High ground or common ground?When should members of Congress seek common ground, and when should they seek to hold the high ground? That’s a question they must ask themselves issue by issue – and one Arkansas voters will have to consider in next year’s elections. Seeking common ground involves cooperation and compromise, while holding the high ground involves standing on principle. Both can be noble, and both can be counterproductive. Each member of Congress must decide w...

Odd argument offered for same-sex marriageThe recent Supreme Court ruling striking down the federal Defense of Marriage Act and striking down a California law prohibiting same sex marriage has once again propelled the political debate over same sex marriage to the forefront. It’s not just a national debate; it’s gaining attention in Arkansas. A group called Arkansans for Equality is working on putting a proposal on the ballot in 2014 that would repeal Arkansas’ Defense of Marriage Ame...

Bill efforts shows a dysfunctional CongressThe current farm law, actually an extension of the 2008 law, will not expire until September so there is no emergency. If that happens, agriculture policy will revert to 1949 laws, which will suit some of our congressmen just fine. However, it would be a disaster for much of Arkansas and other states that rely heavily on a farm-based economy. Here’s a summary of where we are: • On June 10 a new farm bill costing nearly $955 billion over the ne...

College intern learning about parentingWhile working for The Courier this summer, I am once again living with my parents. Two weeks ago, my niece, 4, and my nephew, 7, came to finish their summer with us. It’s been a long two weeks. We’ve been to the movies and Silver Dollar City. We’ve spent hours at the lake swimming and riding on the boat. We go bike riding on a regular basis, and story time is a frequent occurrence. It’s fun and it’s exciting. It’s also exhausting. After three ...

The old reporter and Trayvon MartinI wrote about a guy once. A kid, really. Nineteen, I think. He had some trouble with people who wore another set of gang colors. He walked over to his girlfriend’s house one night, a cold night, and when he got up on her porch, a gun barrel came out of a car window, and they shot the kid three times in the back, which killed him. When the cops got there, the car was gone and the girlfriend was on the porch, screaming, and maybe 15 of the neigh...

Shut it down, Mr. PresidentTrayvon Martin was an unarmed teenager walking home from a convenience store with Skittles and iced tea, when he was shot to death by a racist, profiling wannabe cop named George Zimmerman. In the Big Media, which has relentlessly sought out the voices of those most incensed by the verdict in Sanford, Fla., that is how the Saga of Trayvon Martin is being told. And from listening to TV reports of the rage across black America, that is what is w...

Second harvestLITTLE ROCK — During this growing season in Arkansas, a wide-variety of fresh produce is streaming in to grocery stores and farmers’ markets from fields across the Natural State. Our farms have higher yields than farms in more than half of the other states in our nation. But, like most fields and farms, ours produce more than we can get to market. Farmers leave behind some of their crop that is missed by harvesters or considered unmarketable. ...

Will it take a crisis to fix the debt?Rahm Emanuel, once President Obama’s chief of staff and now mayor of Chicago, told corporate executives in 2008, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that, it’s an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.” That quote has been used to criticize Emanuel, but it’s often certainly been true for this democracy. When something is merely a big problem, action can be delayed even if that delay cau...

What’s there to do in Russellville? Every so often I hear people say, especially read on The Courier’s Facebook page, that there is nothing to do in Russellville. When I hear this, I laugh and say really? Sure, we are a small city in rural Arkansas. We don’t have a mall or an entertainment district or many bright lights that draw folks to some venue. But if you look around, and are willing to get off the couch, there are indeed a number of things for both kids and adults to do i...

The Weekly Post: Technical difficultiesWASHINGTON, D.C. — People always talk about the things they learn when they move to new, exotic places. Things they learn about themselves, about people, about geography, about history — there seems to be a never-ending supply of epiphanies when you move somewhere outside of your comfort zone. What I’ve learned, in the month-and-a-half I’ve been here, is that I wasn’t as culture-shocked by D.C. as I thought I would be. There aren’t people here...

The end is near — seriously Remember how the end of the world was supposed to take place a few months ago? I’m telling you that I’m surprised it didn’t happen this week, but you sure better get your doomsday prepper gear and plans in order for Wednesday, July 17, 2013. In just five days, the return of “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” for its second season on The Learning Channel (TLC) will begin the end of common sense, not to mention decent living, as we know it. I don’t ask ...

Hearts need not failMany things are occurring today that point to the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. However, there still remains the question, “why does He not come and take us out to all this confusion, persecution and turmoil”? Then, like the words of an old song, “but wait a little longer, please, Jesus. There are so many wandering out in sin”. John tells us in Revelation that in the last days, world events will be occurring so fast and furious that ...

A Christian above reproachThe book of Titus is a set of instructions to Titus (and us) about developing leaders. It is a detailed blueprint regarding church discipleship. Christ desires that the church become a purified people for His own possession. He wants to make us zealous for good deeds. Titus 1:6-16 points out both positive and negative qualities that we ought to take note of. While it is clear that Titus 1 is describing male leaders in the position of elder, it...

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Pastor Steve EllisonThe Courier Your Messenger For The River Valley

Just color me squareWhen I was growing up, we had a label for kids who would not go along with some of the habits and antics other kids practiced on a regular basis. We called them square. You remember those days? While I was never an angel, I was not a square either. I was definitely part of the “in” crowd, but in those days the worst of it was some of the kids going to a nearby community that was in a wet county and having a beer. In addition to having a beer n...

The arena of politicsDonald Trump’s tweet Tuesday of this week puts it all in perspective, ”realDonaldTrump: With Spitzer & Anthony Weiner running for office, New York is pervert central! Pathetic.” Why are the dually disgraced Eliot Spitzer and Anthony Weiner running for office after engaging in public peccadilloes that would have doubtless persuaded many a lesser man to stay home? Only they know for sure — their reasoning is probably a bit different than their p...

Punting on part of Obamacare“I can’t think about that right now. If I do, I’ll go crazy. I’ll think about that tomorrow.” Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind. Last week, the Obama administration announced it was putting off a key component of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act regarding employer mandates. The announcement was made through the U.S. Department of Treasury late Wednesday afternoon before a long holiday weekend when few people were paying close...

Friends offering another proposalYou’ve got to credit the Friends of Weiner with persistence. Having failed to stop the closure of the Weiner school, the group is back with an application for a charter school. The idea might work, but it faces an uphill climb. Meanwhile, the high school closed July 1 by order of the state Board of Education after a long-running battle waged by school patrons. By all measures except one, the Weiner school, established in 1883, was successful i...

A sandal scandalParents: Be very, very, very afraid of everything that exists on earth that is not the size of a trampoline. (And then be very scared of THEM. And bouncy houses! Don’t forget to be scared of them, too!) Anything smaller could pose a choking hazard. Take, for example, the Stride Rite shoe called the Joanna sandal. It’s a kiddie sandal decorated with a metal flower about the diameter of a checker. The Consumer Product Safety Commission warns, “T...